Eleven years ago Jill and I took our new Renault Scenic for some coastal holidays . In the first image the car is posing on the breakwater at Portland in Victoria. I still have memories of the bay in the background. When I was a young teenager my parents took me fishing one day in my uncle’s little 14 foot dinghy with an outboard motor on the back. We were drifting along when my father began to hurriedly try and start the motor and flooded it. There was a shark circling the boat and it was bigger than it. Suddenly the engine came to life and we were away. Never again did we go out in that bay. This is a summary of all else that took place in that incident. A short story maybe!

The second shot is a couple of months later at Bermagui in New South Wales. WE were on our way to Canberra and dawdling along the beautiful Sapphire Coast .

Both images were taken with our trusty little Fuji Digital, before the DSLR days.

Last week I met up with an informal haiku sharing group at the Wheeler Writers Centre in Melbourne. A range of haiku written in very different styles was shared and discussed. Rumi, the main energy behind the group attempts to re-write all offered haiku in 3/5/3 traditional as in one sentence of 7-9 words. I have always written 5/7/5 English haiku but have warmed quickly to this other style.

So here are three haiku offerings in 3/5/3/ with an image of course, ( I always have an image) one is serious, one is nature based and one is humorous.

evening comes

hot day tomorrow

start relaxing

hot heads meet

resolution needed

start talking

car won’t start

not air-conditioned

hot outside

The short stories.

The first is a blazing sunset at Ricketts Point last summer showing off the dust from an Indonesian volcano, ( see an earlier page under sunset for a slightly different image).

The second shows three Crested Terns having an interesting chat , perhaps about the availability of fish. These fascinating birds turn up at Ricketts Point late September and stay around into summer.

The third shows three old blokes, myself included abandoning car on a very hot day. There are a number of interesting stories associated with this image, but all too long to go into. Many readers may wonder what on earth this car is, certainly not Australia’s latest . The car is a story in itself but I do not know it.